The present invention relates to the manufacture of substrates. More particularly, the invention provides a technique including a method and a structure for forming multi-layered substrate structures, using a tiled approach, for the fabrication of devices, for example, on flat panel displays. But it will be recognized that the invention has a wider range of applicability; it can also be applied to other substrates for multi-layered integrated circuit devices, three-dimensional packaging of integrated semiconductor devices, photonic devices, piezoelectronic devices, microelectromechanical systems (“MEMS”), nano-technology structures, sensors, actuators, solar cells, biological and biomedical devices, and the like.
From the very early days, human beings have been building useful articles, tools, or devices using less useful materials for numerous years. In some cases, articles are assembled by way of smaller elements or building blocks. Alternatively, less useful articles are separated into smaller pieces to improve their utility. A common example of these articles to be separated include substrate structures, such as a glass plate, a diamond, a semiconductor substrate, a flat panel display, and others. These substrate structures are often cleaved or separated using a variety of techniques. In some cases, the substrates can be separated using a saw operation. The saw operation generally relies upon a rotating blade or tool, which cuts through the substrate material to separate the substrate material into two pieces. This technique, however, is often extremely “rough” and cannot generally be used for providing precision separations in the substrate for the manufacture of fine tools and assemblies. Additionally, the saw operation often has difficulty separating or cutting extremely hard and or brittle materials, such as diamond or glass. Additionally, the saw operation has difficulty in manufacturing larger substrates for flat panel displays and the like.
Accordingly, techniques have been developed to fabricate flat panel display substrates. These substrates are often fabricated on large sheets of glass or other like structures. The sheets of glass are subjected to thin film processing at lower temperatures. Amorphous silicon is often used to form thin film transistor devices on these sheets of glass. Amorphous silicon, however, suffers from a variety of known limitations.
As an example, amorphous silicon often has higher resistance than conventional single crystal silicon. Additionally, amorphous silicon may be difficult to use for high speed device applications due to its low relative carrier mobility. Accordingly, certain techniques have been developed to cleave a thin film of crystalline material from a larger donor substrate portion. These techniques are commonly known as “layer transfer” processes. Such layer transfer processes have been useful in the manufacture of specialized substrate structures, such as silicon on insulator or display substrates. As merely an example, a pioneering technique was developed by Francois J. Henley and Nathan Chung to cleave films of materials. Such technique has been described in U.S. Pat. No. 6,013,563 titled Controlled Cleaving Process, assigned to Silicon Genesis Corporation of San Jose, Calif., and hereby incorporated by reference for all purposes. Although such technique has been successful, there is still a desire for improved ways of manufacturing multilayered structures.
From the above, it is seen that a technique for manufacturing large substrates which is cost effective and efficient is desirable.